The Responsibility Of Motherhood

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Title:     The Responsibility Of Motherhood
Author: Elinor Glyn [More Titles by Glyn]

As far as the necessities for it go in the animal world, nearly all animals have a very strong sense of the responsibility of motherhood--unless they have become over-civilised, or live under unnatural circumstances. A striking example of the consequences of the latter state of being is shown by "Barbara," that thrillingly attractive Polar bear in the Zoo, whose twelfth and thirteenth infants were only the other day condemned to follow their brothers and sisters to an early grave through their parents'--and especially their mother's--gross stupidity about their bringing-up and welfare. And we who are human animals, given by God conscious souls, ought to realise the fact that civilisation and pampered environment have enormously blunted our natural instincts in this respect, just as they have Barbara's, and so we should try to restore the loss by consciously cultivating our understanding of the subject and deliberately realising the tremendous responsibilities we incur by bringing children into the world. When we think about the matter quietly, the magnitude of it is almost overwhelming, and yet there are hundreds and thousands of women who never give it a serious thought! They have some vague idea that to have children is the inevitable result of matrimony, and that if they pay others to feed and clothe the little creatures, and give them some instruction in the way that they should go, their own part of the affair is finished. That, until a child is grown to an age to judge for itself, the parents will be held responsible for their stewardship of its body and soul at the great tribunal of God does not strike them, and it is only perhaps when the boomerang of their neglect has returned to them and blasted them with calamity that they become conscious of their past negligence.

In this article I do not propose to touch upon the father's side of the question, important as it is, but shall confine myself to the mother's, because this has always been one of my deep preoccupations to think out the meaning of it all, and how best to fulfil the trust. Obviously the sole aim of true motherhood is the moral and physical welfare of the child, and to accomplish this end we should understand that it is quite impossible to lay down any set rule, or go by any recognised and unchangeable method. For in one age certain precepts are taught which are obsolete in the next, because science and the improvement of mechanical aids to well-being advance with such giant strides. But if we keep the end in view it is simple enough to see that common sense and discrimination, unclouded by custom or sentiment or superstition, can accomplish miracles. The circumstances of the particular case must always govern the method to be used in order to obtain the same given end, no matter what the station in life of the parents. Thus every mother, from the humblest to the highest, ought to think out how she can best procure her child moral and physical welfare according to her means.

In the lives of the very poor the only thing to be done for the betterment of the understanding of the responsibility of motherhood seems to be to teach the simplest rules of hygiene which animals know by instinct, and after that for the State to take care of the children as much as possible. For this very strange fact is in operation, namely, that while Nature leaves an insatiable desire to create life, she allows civilisation to rob human beings of instinctive knowledge of how to preserve it in its earliest stages, and that the human mother is of all creation the only one entirely at the mercy of imparted knowledge as regards the proper treatment of her offspring.

Into the conception of the duties of motherhood among the very poor we cannot go in this short paper--the subject is too vast--so we must confine ourselves to discussing those of a higher class where, having the means to do well, the responsibilities are far greater. I want, if I can, to open a window, as it were, upon the outlook of the general responsibility of motherhood and let each class apply what it gathers of the meaning, if it wishes, to its own circumstances.

It is the aim and end of a thing which is of sole importance; in this case the aim and end being the happiness and welfare of the child. And that is the point which I want to harp upon, the necessity of keeping the goal in view and of not wandering off into side issues. It was for the sake of the end, namely, obtaining happiness, that I tried to show in my articles upon marriage how common sense might secure this desired state. And it was to the end of what might be best for England that I pleaded for the necessity of using fair judgment over the question of facilitating or restricting divorce. And it is now to the end of helping the coming race to be fine and true that I want to talk about the responsibility of motherhood.

Let us take the subject from the very beginning.

PRE-NATAL INFLUENCES

The thought for the child should commence with the first knowledge of its coming birth. A tremendous control of self, and emotions, and foolish habits, and a stern command of nerves should be the prospective mother's constant effort, as science has proved that all pre-natal influences have such powerful effect upon the child; and, surely, if any woman stopped to think of the colossal responsibility she has undertaken in having become the vehicle to bring a soul from God to earth, she would at least try to employ as much intelligence in the fulfilment of her obligation as she puts into succeeding in any of the worldly pursuits in life. Think of the hours some women spend in painful discipline by going through exercises to keep their figures young and their faces beautiful--the massage! the cures! and the "rests" they take to this end--but who let their waiting time for motherhood be passed in a sort of relaxation of all control--getting into tempers, indulging in nerves, over-smoking, or tiring themselves out with excitement without one thought for the coming little one, except as an inevitable necessity or a shocking nuisance. During this period the wise woman ought to study such matters as heredity. She ought to view the characteristics of her own and her husband's families, and then firmly determine to counteract the objectionable features in them by making her own mind dwell upon only good and fine attributes for her child. She ought to try to keep herself in perfect health by using common sense, and, above all, she should determine to fight and conquer the nervous emotions which more or less beset all women at such time. She ought to encourage happy and loving relations with her husband, and try in every way to be in herself good and gentle and brave. It is the most important moment in the whole of a woman's life for self-discipline, because of the prodigious results of all her moods and actions upon the child, and yet, as I said before, it is one of the commonest sights to see a woman who at other times is a very good sort of creature, simply letting herself go and becoming an insupportable bore to her husband and the whole house, with her perverseness and her nerves and her fads.

If they could analyse causes, what bitter reproaches many poor little diseased, neurotic children might truly throw at their irresponsible mothers for endowing them with these evils before birth.

THE CASE OF TWO WOMEN

When the child is born--again it is only its welfare which should be thought of by the mother, and not what custom or family opinion would enforce. To me it seems that no mother ought to undertake any of the so-called duties of a mother that she is incapable of performing to the advantage of the child, who would be better cared for by employing highly trained service. She should only force herself to do her best in uncongenial tasks if circumstances make it impossible for her to obtain a better nurse or teacher for her infant than she herself could be. She must constantly keep the end in view, so as to stamp out prejudice and out-of-date methods; especially she should guard against making the child suffer for her own fads and experiments. I believe I shall better illustrate what I mean by "keeping the end in view" if I give a few concrete examples, instead of trying to explain in the abstract.

Here is one example.

There were two women of my acquaintance, one of whom had an exquisitely obedient, perfectly brought-up little girl of five who was her constant thought, and a baby of two months. This mother could afford an excellent nurse, and left all the physical care of the infant to her, concentrating her intelligence upon wise general supervision, and upon the training of the little girl whose dawning character was her study. The other mother had two very ill-behaved, disobedient children of five and seven, and a baby of three months. She spent her time washing and dressing the infant, fussing over it and caressing it from morning to night, and interfering with the paid nurse, who well knew her duties. She was also quite indifferent to her appearance, and wearied her husband to death with her over-domesticity. But she felt herself to be a perfect and affectionate wife and mother, and strongly censured the other woman when she admitted that she had never washed or dressed her baby, and was even rather nervous when she held it in case she should hurt its tender neck and head. But the proof that the first woman was a true and good guardian of God's gift to her was in the finely trained little girl, and the proof of the second woman's undevelopment from the animal stage was in her concentrated and, in the circumstances, unnecessary preoccupation with the infant, to the entire neglect of the character training of the elder children. Had they both been so poor that actual physical care of the infants devolved solely upon each mother, the first would have used all her intelligence to discover the sensible and common-sense way to carry out her duties, and the second would have continued using any obsolete method she had been accustomed to, while she lavished silly fuss and attention upon the baby.

FORE-THOUGHT FOR BEAUTY

The first woman had the end in view; the second did not look ahead at all, but simply indulged her own selfishly animal instincts, without a thought of what would be best for her child.

The apparently "good" mothers might be divided into two classes--the animal mothers and the spiritual mothers. The animal mothers are better than indifferent, and therefore abnormal, mothers, but are far below spiritual mothers, for they, the animal mothers, are only obeying natural instincts which have happily survived in them, but obeying them only as animals do, without reason or conscience. And the spiritual mother uses her common sense and tries to secure the continual welfare of her child, looking ahead for all eventualities, from matters of health to personal appearance, as well as character training and soul elevation.

Numbers of women think that if they follow out the same lines of bringing-up for their children as are the recognised ones employed by their class they have fully done their duty, and that if the children do not profit by the stereotyped lessons of religion and behaviour that have been imparted to them by proper teachers it is the fault of the children, and a misfortune which they, the mothers, must bear with more or less resignation.

But indeed this is not so.

Let us take a spiritual mother's duties in rotation, beginning with the most material. After bringing into the world the healthiest infant her common sense has been able to secure, she should guard against any physical disability accruing to it that she can prevent. In all matters of health she should either make a great study of the subject herself, or employ trained aid to its accomplishment; but beyond this there are other things which, if she neglects them, the boy or girl could reproach her for afterwards and with reason. One is the fore-thought for beauty. How many boys' whole personal appearances are ruined by standing-out ears! How many little girls' complexions are irretrievably spoilt by unsuitable soap having been used which has burnt red veins into their tender cheeks. These two small examples are entirely the fault of the mother and do not lie at the door of uncorrected habits in the children themselves. No boy's ears need stick out; there are caps and every sort of contrivance yearly being improved upon to obviate this disfigurement. No girl need have anything but a beautiful skin if her mother uses intelligence and supervises the early treatment of it. Because if she has the end in view, the mother will know that her little boy or girl will probably grow up and desire affection and happiness, and that beauty is a means not to be discounted to obtain these good things, and, for the securing of them, is relatively as important as having a well-endowed mind.

THE SPIRITUAL MOTHER

When the first dawning characteristics begin to show, the spiritual mother's study of heredity will begin to stand her in good stead, for she must never forget that every expressed thought and action of a small child shows the indication of some undeveloped instinct, and should be watched by a sensible mother, so that she may decide which one to encourage and which one to curb, and, if possible, eradicate. Should there be some strong inherited tendency which is not good, then her most careful care and influence will be needed. There is not the slightest use in making rules and then leaving their enforcement to servants and governesses--the true mother should see that her child thoroughly understands what it is being asked to do, and why it is being asked to do it. She should appeal to its intelligence from earliest days, and make it comprehend it is for its own benefit. For children cannot when very young be influenced by high moral considerations which come with maturer years, but only by personal gain or fear--and if ruled by fear they invariably become deceitful. It is a spiritual mother's business to show interest in all her child's tastes and occupations, and to supervise and direct them into the best channels, and if she has several children she should watch each one's idiosyncrasies and not imagine that the same method will do for them all. What good gardener would treat a rose-tree in the same fashion which he does a tulip bulb? The spiritual mother should think out for herself, guided by what she sees are their personal needs, the best method of instructing her children in true morality--that is, honour and truth, and freedom from all hypocrisy and deceit. She should not be influenced by any set-down rules of religion or dogma, or by any precepts she may have been taught herself in her youth, if they no longer convey conviction because of the change in time, otherwise she will be following custom and losing sight of the end. She should make her children understand that the soiling of their own souls by committing mean actions is the greatest sin, and that what other people think or do not think of them is of no consequence, but the only vital things are what God thinks and they think of themselves. Hundreds of children's afterlives are shipwrecked because they were only taught all the dry dogmas and seemings of religion, and the real meaning was never explained to them. I know a rigorously strict clergyman's family where the children are taught and conform to all the observances of their father's church, and yet a falser, more paltry set of young creatures could not be found--they have never had it explained to them that it is impossible to hoodwink God. For a perfect example of the religious spirit not to employ towards children, all mothers ought to read the immortal scene between Trilby before she dies and Mrs. Bagot--when the narrow woman expresses her puny views and Trilby puts forth her broad and true ones. It is so incredibly stupid to use obsolete methods which can never obtain the desired end just because the dominion of custom is still strong upon us, and we have not been intelligent enough to grasp and benefit by the spirit of the age. For all mothers must realise that they can never dominate the spirit of the age, and must either make vain fights with it, and be conquered to their loss, or must make terms with it and use it in its brightest and best aspect. The spirit of this age is a totally different one to the spirit of their own childhood's age. It is shorn of reverence and unquestioning obedience to elders, and is an independent creature who will only obey through conviction of good or personal benefit. Children are unerring and pitiless judges of those placed over them, and how can a mother, just because she is a mother, expect respect and reverence in her children if she earns their contempt by her conduct and selfishness?

It is the spiritual mother's duty to instil chivalry towards the other sex into her little sons from earliest years, by making them polite to herself and to their sisters. She should, before they go to school and when they return for the holidays, endeavour to influence them into liking cleanliness and care of their persons, especially when with ladies. She should try to make these little men so happy and contented, so certain of sympathy and understanding that home spells heaven for them and remains the dearest memory of their lives, and for her little girls, over whom she has a far vaster influence, she should polish their minds, explain all the true and pure principles of life--teach them the value of self-control and self-respect, and watch for and encourage all their graces, so that when they arrive at the ages of seventeen and eighteen they may be fitted in all points to shine in whatever world they belong to, and take their places among the best of their class. Space forbids me to go on longer, although the subject seems only just to have been begun, so large is its sphere of action, but I must give one last concrete example of two women's methods, to enforce my meaning of the importance of the end.

Both sent their girls to the same school, where every accomplishment was taught and the highest tone prevailed that the masters could inculcate. The first mother showed deep interest in the holidays, in all her child's lessons, directed and encouraged her, opening her understanding and broadening her point of view, while she attended to every physical grace. She explained how her child should apply the knowledge she acquired during term, so that it should grow interesting, and as far as it lay in her power she endeavoured that her daughter should be fitted with every charm and attraction which could procure for her later on a larger selection from which to choose her partner in life. The other mother let her girl run wild during the holidays, and allowed her to feel that all she learned was just an irksome duty to be forgotten the moment school was over. Her appearance, her gentle manners, her refinement, her point of view, were all left to take their own chance, from the mistaken idea that it would encourage vanity and egotism in the girl to discuss these things with her--and that she, the mother, had done all that was required of her in simply providing a good education! This second mother had completely lost sight of the end, you see, and was unconsciously only thinking of herself and not of her child at all.

And this--to think of the welfare of the child and allow no other point to obscure this--is the whole meaning of the responsibility of motherhood.

 

THE RESPONSIBILITY OF MOTHERHOOD. SECOND PAPER

What I always wish to impress upon the readers who are kind enough to be interested in the articles which I write is to keep the end aimed at in view. So in this second paper upon the responsibility of motherhood, I must begin by reiterating this necessity.

No mother has a right to drift and trust to chance for the welfare of her children, and however they develop, for good or ill, she must in greater or lesser degree be held responsible.

The period when animals cease all interest in and care for their offspring only commences when these latter can safely be left to look after themselves; and so it should be with human beings. But, judging the ages relatively of animals and mankind, numbers of human mothers entirely neglect their progeny long before they have come even to the fledgling stage! How often in society one sees women of forty-five and younger with daughters of fifteen to twenty, about whose real characters and souls they know nothing! They have always been too busy with their own personal interest to give the time and sympathy required for a real mother's understanding of her children. Servants and governesses have been the directors through the most critical period of the girls' lives, and it is merely a piece of luck if they have imbibed no ill from them.

There are numbers of worthy and innocent women married to men whose characters have certain forcible and unpleasant traits, which are more than likely to be reproduced in their children, but from the limited education these good creatures have received, and the absence of all habit of personal analysation of cause and effect, they never realise that it is their bounden duty to be on the lookout for the first signs of the hereditary traits appearing, and the necessity for using special care and influence to counteract them.

A woman (unless too vain) knows very well her own failings and her own good qualities, and can, if she is wise, suppress or encourage them when they show in her children; but she cannot trace the characteristics of remote ancestors, or even be certain of what her husband has on his side endowed their joint offspring with, so her duty is to be on the watch from the very commencement, and to use her intelligence as she already uses it in every ordinary affair in life.

People of even the most mediocre understanding are quite sensible enough to select the right implements to carry on any work that they have undertaken. A woman about to sew a fine piece of muslin does not dash haphazard into her work-basket and pick out any needle which comes first, and any thread, coarse or fine, which is handy. She would know very well that her work would be a sorry affair if she did so, and that, on the contrary, she must choose the exact fineness of both thread and needle to sew this particular bit of stuff satisfactorily, the ones she may have employed an hour before upon firm cloth being of no use for muslin.

She is keeping the end in view.

LOOKING AHEAD

But countless numbers of mothers never understand that any different method is necessary with different children; they just go on in the old way they have been taught when young themselves, if they trouble at all about the matter.

Every woman who has a child ought to ask herself these questions: Who is responsible for this child being in the world? Am I and my husband responsible, or is the child responsible itself? The answers are ridiculously obvious, and, when realised, the remembrance of them should entail grave obligations upon the parents.

The mother should look ahead and try to determine whether or no what seems to be showing as the result of the ideas of up-bringing in the past fifteen years is good or bad.

The main features of that system being the relaxation of all discipline and the cessation of the inculcation of self-control, because the standards suddenly became different. Formerly, to perform Duty (spelt with a big D!) was the only essential matter in life, and to obtain happiness was merely a thing by the way. In the past fifteen years the essential goal sought after has been happiness, and duty has been merely the thing by the way. But a very large number of the mothers of England have not perhaps begun to develop sufficient scope of brain to enable them to judge what will eventually bring happiness; they can only see the immediate moment, and to indulge their children's every desire seems to be the simplest way. But they forget that during this short and impressionable stage of life all strength and will-power and self-control ought to be enforced and encouraged, to enable the loved children to withstand hardships and to attract happiness in the long after years. A mother should ask herself if it is worth while, in securing a joyous and irresponsible childhood and adolescence, to leave her children at the end of them unarmed and at the mercy of every adverse blast. The great dangers which seem to be resulting from the system of upbringing in the last fifteen years are that at seventeen or eighteen most young people are satiated with pleasure and blase with life, while they have no definite aim or end of achievement in view, and absolutely no sense of duty or responsibility to the community.

THE FIRST OBLIGATION

It would seem to me that a mother's first obligation is to enforce discipline, and to teach self-control from the earliest infancy with the fondest loving care, and to transmit that sense of responsibility for noble citizenship into her children which should have been her own guiding star.

But, again, to do so she must not employ obsolete methods without taking into account the spirit of the age which has aroused a sense of personal liberty in the youngest child, and makes it refuse to accept rules and regulations on trust. It must be convinced that they are for its good, or it will only bow to them by fear, learn to deceive, and remain rebellious and determined at the first opportunity to throw off the yoke and go its own way. I will give a concrete case of what I mean upon this point, to show how even a good woman can misunderstand the real meaning of the responsibility of motherhood, and by her method of upbringing can allow misfortune to fall upon her young family.

Here is a lady of the highest rank, who comes of a steady and worthy stock, and who has been brought up herself strictly and well. She marries a man of great position, but with rather wild blood in his veins. She has no modern ideas of only desiring a small family; she wishes to and intends to do her duty to her state, and is by no means set upon personal amusement.

As the years go on she becomes the mother of four boys and two girls. She engages the best nurses for them, and, later on, the best governesses and tutors. The children are taught their catechism on Sundays and are drilled as those of their class into having good outward manners and behaviour. They are given orders without explanations, which they are expected to obey unquestioningly, and they are duly punished when they are disobedient. They see their parents at stated hours each day, and are seemingly a well-regulated and satisfactory young brood.

The good woman and great lady's time is naturally much occupied with social duties, and duties to her husband's tenants, and to various charities and good works in which she is interested. She fulfils all these admirably, and is generally held in affection and respect. All the children have been treated exactly the same by her, although she knows that her husband has a dishonourable, gambling, scapegrace brother who has had to be sent to Australia, and that her husband himself has had tastes, the reverse of orthodox where his emotions were concerned, though happily he has not jeopardised the family fortunes as his brother would have done had he been head. All the children have been so well brought up and instructed in the tenets of the Church that she feels quite placid and sure that she has done all that could be expected of her, and is horribly surprised and distressed when disasters presently occur. She looks upon them as the will of God and fate, but feels in no way to blame personally.

A HATRED OF PREACHING

It had never struck her intelligence that boys with such heredity in them should have been specially influenced and directed from earliest youth towards ideas of the finest honour and proudest responsibility in keeping unblemished their ancient name; that all the stupidities and follies of gambling should have been pointed out to them; that the certain temptations which are bound to beset the path of those in their position should have been fully explained to them--all this done in a simple, common-sense fashion which would convince their understanding. She had never thought that it would be wise to make them clearly comprehend why they should try to resist bad habits and youthful lusts of the flesh--not so much from the point of view that such things are sins, as because science and experience have shown that the indulgence in them spoils health and brain and pleasure in manhood. Boys are creatures full of common sense, and their education in public schools broadens and helps their understanding of logical sequences, if only things are explained to them without mystery and too much spiritual emphasis being put upon them. They so hate being preached at! No young, growing person in normal animal health and spirits can be guided and coerced to resist the desires of the body solely by religious and moral teaching; he must have some definite reward and gain upon this earth held out to him as well; there must be some tangible reason for abstinence to convince his imagination and strengthen his will. And the gain he is offered if he resists certain temptations is that he will grow strong and powerful, and the better able, when his judgment is ripe enough to discriminate properly, to enjoy real pleasures later on. When the adolescent spiritual self begins to rule him, then the moral point can be more forcibly pressed home; but it is quite futile while he is at the growing animal stage.

Our good and highly placed mother of whom we are speaking has never thought of any of these laws of cause and effect, as applied to her own nearest and dearest, although she is accustomed to think out schemes for the betterment and development of her Girls' Friendly societies, or for furthering her husband's political interests in the country.

INHERITED CHARACTER

She sees good little well-behaved daughters coming down in "the children's hour" and receives favourable reports from the governesses, and has no idea, or even any speculation about what strange and new thoughts and emotions may be commencing to germinate in their brains. Mildred has perhaps inherited her father's volage nature where the other sex are concerned, and early shows tendencies which ought to be sympathetically checked and directed. Catherine has got a strong touch of Uncle Billy's unscrupulousness, and is often deceitful and scheming, with a wonderful aptitude for the nursery dominoes and other games of chance. But both, taught by Fraulein or Mademoiselle--and that good old Nurse Timson!--only show their mother their sweetest side when in her company, and are meek, well-behaved little mice, influenced to be thus not from any moral conviction--because if that were so they would be good at all times as well--but swayed by the certain knowledge of personal physical gain if they make a good impression upon mother, and certain punishment and unpleasantness from the governesses if they do not. All goes along smoothly until the rising sap of nature begins to dominate their lives; then some outward and visible sign of their inherited tendencies begins to show, the force causing its expression being stronger for the time than any other thing.

One of the boys gambles, and goes to the Jews for money. The eldest son and heir, who has never had the wiles of women revealed and explained to him, or the temptations which are bound to be thrust upon him because of his great position in the world pointed out to him, succumbs to the fascinations and falls into the snares of a cunning chorus girl. Our good mother and great lady has steadily avoided even admitting that there can be sex questions in life, and has rigorously banished all possible discussion of them as not being a subject which should be talked of in any nice family. She has never given any especial teaching to arouse pride in his old name in her eldest son, or impressed the great responsibility there is in the worthy guardianship of the fine position God has endowed him with. He has just been allowed to drift with the rest, and, unwarned and unarmed, has fallen in the first fight with his physical emotions.

INSTINCTS UNCHECKED

A third son is apparently the darling of the gods; he is full of charm. But, fearing that the gambling propensities of his second brother should come out in him also, his parents keep him with special strictness and very short of money. The same absence of all explanations of the meaning of things has been his portion as well as that of his brothers and sisters. He has never been enlightened as to the possible workings of heredity, and shown how that as the vice of gambling is in the blood it will require special will-power to overcome it. None of these things has been pointed out to him, and so, being restive at restraint and worried for money, he soon slips into easy ways, and often allows women to help him in his difficulties. Uncle Billy's instincts and his own father's have combined in him. Both could have been checked and diverted into sane channels with loving foresight and knowledge and sympathy.

The fourth son goes early into the Navy, and the discipline and the inheritance of his mother's more level qualities turn him into a splendid fellow; but this is mere chance, and cannot be counted as accruing from his mother's care.

Here is a case where every outward circumstance seemed to be propitious, and where both parents were good and respected members of their class and race. But neither had the intelligence to realise an end, or consciously to keep it in view; they were solely ruled by tradition and what seemed to them--especially the mother--to be the proper and well-established religious methods for the bringing up of their children. So the remorseless laws of cause and effect rolled on their Juggernaut car and crushed the victims.

Now, if this mother had had the end--that of her children's happiness and welfare--really in view, she would have questioned herself as to the best methods of obtaining that end, and would not have been content just to go on with the narrow ideas which had held sway in her own day, and which had perhaps then succeeded very well, because, as I said before, they were aided by the two forces now stultified--namely, a tremendous discipline and a spirit of the age which brought no suggestion of a struggle for personal liberty to young minds. Had she thought out all these things, she would have understood the responsibilities of motherhood in their real sense, and not only in the sense which the outward appearance judges good. She would have poured love and sympathy on each one of her children separately and individually, since she was the half-cause of their coming to earth. She would have studied each one's character, and with determined concentration have inculcated the necessary pride in fine actions in them, knowing what their pitfalls would be likely to be. She would have taught the simple religion of respect for the loan God has made in giving their bodies a soul, and she would have watched for possible signs of ill, and would finally have guided each one through the dangerous age on to the time when every man and woman must answer for himself and herself.

Heredity is sometimes stronger than even the wisest bringing up; but who can say how many families might not have been saved and kept together by a prudent and understanding mother's love?

There is a story, which exactly illustrates the point of the importance of keeping the end in view, told of the Iron Duke in the Peninsular War. I cannot remember the exact details, and they are of no consequence. The point is this: There was a certain tremendously obstinate Spanish general whom the Duke (then Sir Arthur Wellesley) found very difficult to lead. The moment had arrived when it was absolutely necessary for success that this general should move his troops to a certain position. He was a man filled with his own importance, and he refused huffily to do so unless the English chief went down upon his knees to him!

The Iron Duke is reported to have replied to this message in some such words as these: "Good Lord! the winning of the day is the essential thing, not the resisting of the man's vanity! I'll go down upon my knees with pleasure if that will make him move his troops!" He did, and the Spanish general conceded the request and the day was won.

The great commander and astute Englishman had the end in view, you see, whereas the lesser brain of the Spaniard would have sacrificed the battle for a personal whim, having lost sight, in his vanity, of the importance of the main issue.

How many parents do this day after day and year after year, clinging to obsolete methods, trying to rule by worn-out precepts, all because--when you come to analyse it--their own sense of importance really matters to them more than their children's welfare, and no one has opened their eyes to see themselves and their actions in the true light.

Although the case which I have just given of the seemingly good mother was drawn from the highest class, and so at first sight might not be said to apply to lesser grades, yet I want to show that this is not so, but that the same principle applies to the most modest little family.

Every mother should study how best she can develop and elevate the souls which by her own part-action she has brought into being, and make that aim her first thought--for surely the satisfaction of the feeling that one has succeeded in training one's own children to high ideals and the attainment of happiness would be greater in old age than any gratification from the acquirement of social supremacy or realised personal ambitions.

I would implore every mother, of any class, ruthlessly to reject all the rules which she has been taught for the guidance of her family, unless she has proved with common sense that they can be profitably applied to each particular case. I would ask her to keep to no transmitted axiom, unless it comes up to the requirements of the ever-changing and ever-advancing day. There is only one unchangeable and immutable command which we should follow, and this is that we should not soil our souls, or render them up to God degraded and smirched when we go hence upon that journey from whence no man returneth.

In summing up both my articles upon the responsibility of motherhood, I find that in this second one I have made two statements which might read as contradictions. Firstly, I spoke of young people requiring personal gain to be held out to them as a reason for committing, or refraining from committing, certain actions; and then, a paragraph or two afterwards, I gave the illustration of the little girls' good behaviour to their mother as being only caused by the fact that it was more to their advantage so to behave. What I meant to show was that while boys are young and full of the rising impulses of nature they very rarely can have acquired sufficient spiritual belief to make them refrain from indulging in certain pleasures--or what seem pleasures to them--merely because they have been told these pleasures are wrong. For instance, on the subject of smoking. What boy will stop smoking by being told it is wrong and that he is sinning by his disobedience? But there are many intelligent ones who will not indulge in it if it is explained to them that smoking will stop their growth and make them less likely to succeed in the cricket eleven, or, later, in the college eight. At that period the mind cannot look into unseen worlds, and is mainly occupied with realities from day to day, and therefore is more likely to be influenced by a simple explanation of what physical harm or what good in the immediate future will be the result of actions.

The little girls' behaviour to their mother is really an example of this same rule, only the principle for their action was not good, being merely temporary and strictly limited gain, and not that they should, as in the case of the boys, grow into fine, strong and healthy people, more able to enjoy life in the future.

There is another statement which I have constantly made which possibly might be twisted or misunderstood, and that is the one of the importance of the end. There are people who would turn it into the Jesuitical motto of "The end justifies the means." That is not what I wished to convey at all, but that if an end is good--and the main object, admittedly, is to obtain it--then there is no use in using methods which once might have accomplished this, but which no longer are practical because of the changed conditions, and if continued in will only lose all possibility of success.

How many fathers and mothers in past days have driven their offspring to disgrace and even death by adhering to harsh, Puritanical systems, out of date even at that time! And how many more to-day let them slip into the same abysses by their too indulgent rule!

As I have said, over and over again, the proof of any pudding is in the eating of it; so let every mother examine her methods with her children by this standard: Are the children developing in moral and physical welfare by those which she is using, or are they retrogressing? Is she employing tact to guide their young fierce spirits, or is she trying to crush them by old-fashioned rules?

Questions such as these ought to be honestly asked by each mother of herself, and if the answer proves that retrogression is in progress, then she should not be so incredibly stupid as to continue in her old lines, but should examine herself and see how she can find the right new ones for her particular cases. La Rochefoucauld was wise when he said that vanity was at the root of most human mistakes. If a woman is not willing to undertake the true responsibility of motherhood, then she had far better be that sad thing which is a growing quantity in modern civilisation, namely, a childless wife devoted to dogs. Hundreds of selfish, neurotic females show the utmost unselfish devotion to wretched little pet animals, when the slightest self-denial asked of them for little human atoms is more than they can accord. What does this mean? Is it a writing upon the wall?

[The end]
Elinor Glyn's essay: The Responsibility Of Motherhood

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